Arts & Entertainment
Sewn Into Memory from page 38
in," she says. This means "you don't shield
works were exceptional from the
yourself from what's happening. Then text
first tapestryl felt so proud of her
and so impressed by its beauty, and brings another dimension that provides a
thread that takes you from one image to
I was thrilled to have it in my fam-
another."
ily as a keepsake," she says. "But it
Steinhardt often watches audience reac-
wasn't until I saw she was creating
tions to her mother's tapestries, "and it
a body of work that I realized it
really reaches so many different kinds
needed to go beyond my family."
of people: children and adults, Jews and
Steinhardt is an executive with
gentiles, Poles who live in the same area
the Government Accountability
where my mother grew up, African-
Office, an investigative arm of
Americans who have experienced racism."
Congress,
so
organizing
an
art
Coming To America: Embroidery and fabric col-
It also never fails to affect Steinhardt
exhibit
was
a
bit
new
Yet
she
and
lage, 1988.
herself.
her sister had many friends who,
"As many times as I heard my mother
equally astonished by the tapes-
each picture. Her first work to feature both tries, stepped forward to help
Photo by Sanford Bloom/ Courtesy Art & Remembrance
an image and words showed, she said, "the create Art and Remembrance,
which comprises volunteers
beginning of the end." On Friday, Oct. 15,
only.
1942, Esther and her sister, Mania, stood
"We felt there are many other
alongside a road as the Nazis forced the
people in other parts of world
Jewish men, women and children from
and in other situations who also
Rachow, Poland, to their deaths.
experienced racism, intoler-
The picture shows faces of fear and
ance and other forms of social
confusion and sorrow. Krinitz remembers
injustice who have stories that
everyone weeping, and many calling to
are all important for us to hear
God.
and who have expressed them
Yet there is beauty, too, in the periwin-
as art:' Steinhardt says. "The
kle sky and the blue-and-orange paisley
combination of art and story is
of a skirt, the cherry-red of a little girl's
an incredibly important way to
coat and the golden leaves falling on the
connect to people's hearts and
ground where they will be held by the
minds."
wind, danced away, then gone forever.
Certain visual images, such as
Krinitz worked in the evening or when
the tapestries, "are just so acces-
she had a free moment at her store.
Esther Nisenthal Krinitz
sible, so inviting they draw you
Her daughter Bernice knew Krinitz's
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tell her story, I never grew tired of it," she
says. And when she speaks at places where
the tapestries are on exhibit, she will look
at the works again, always with amaze-
ment and gratitude. And when she hears
the recorded voice of her late mother on a
brief documentary that accompanies the
exhibit, she still wants to listen.
"So many people will go back and see
it again and again," she says. "It's just so
strong. It has an incredibly deep reach into
people's hearts."
Elizabeth Applebaum is a marketing
specialist at the Jewish Community
Center of Metropolitan Detroit.
"Through the Eye of the Needle
— Fabric of Survival" runs June
10-Aug. 9 at the Janice Charach
Epstein Gallery, located in the D.
Dan & Betty Kahn Building of the
Jewish Community Center in West
Bloomfield. In addition to the exhibit,
the gallery will host a tea with both
Bernice Steinhardt and Helene
McQuade at 2 p.m. Sunday, July 15.
Bernice Steinhardt also will be at
the gallery for the opening reception
at 2 p.m. Sunday, June 10. Gallery
hours are 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Mondays-
Thursdays and noon-4 p.m. Sundays.
For information, call (248) 432-
5448 or go to www.jccdetroit.org .
Sparking Spirituality
New book ties
fiber art to Judaism.
L
ouise Silk's first published work,
The Quilting Path: A Guide to
Spiritual Discovery Through
Fabric, Thread and Kabbalah (Skylight
Paths;$16.99), really isapatchworkand r as
such,falls in line with herdeepest interest,
quilting.
The author intertwines her lifestory and
spiritual choices with the sewing tech-
niques she uses and teaches. "By writing
out all the information, I was able to bring
together how I've been doing with my life,"
says the 57-year-old Silk, who is based in
Pittsburgh. "I recalled the problems I had
finding the way that I was Jewish.
"I identified with Jewish things, but
I came to understand
that my expression
of Judaism could be
through quilting. That
was a big opening for
me."
The book, which
offers illustrations to
clarify specific instruc-
tions, covers one-patch
utility quilts, wearable
quilts and remembrance
quilts among many
other projects. Step-by-step directions
are given.
In recounting her own life experienc-
es, the author also explains how one
quilting project can lead to the next.
Silk, a home-economics teacher,
started making quilts after reading
THE
about the discipline as a
woman's art form in the
1970s.
"One day, I had a revela-
tion that my quilting was
boring and getting a little
stale," she says. "I thought
that if I put some Jewish
content in it, my work
would be changed, and
that's what happened. As
6.1kilVf St.ttlf
an artist, I reinvented ritu-
als that work for me."
Silk, who started entering her fabric
projects into art shows and has won
awards for them, studied Buddhism
and Kabbalah and has combined both
into her self-structured religious prac-
tices and approaches to fabric art. One
quilt depicts the Jewish calendar.
ILT1NG
PATH
"I was always interested in Kabbalah
because I was interested in mystical
ideas, but I could never get a handle
on it," says Silk, who accepts corn-
missions for religious objects, such as
chuppahs and prayer shawls.
"As I started religious studies, I real-
ized that Kabbalah was experiential. It
became natural to apply Kabbalah to
quilting because quilting is experien-
tial."
Silk, who uses vintage fabrics and
makes quilted wall art, will show one of
her spiritual quilts inthe "Sacred Threads
2007 Exhibition," running June 16-30 in
Reynoldsburg, Ohio. I
- Suzanne Chessler
To contact Louise Silk, go to
www.silkquilt.com .
n e 7 2 0 07
39